


My Kind Of Girl

by flowercrownfemme



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: 15-Year-Old Harry Styles, 17-Year-Old Louis Tomlinson, 20-Year-Old Harry, 22-Year-Old Louis, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Dog Walker!Harry, F/F, Girl Direction, Mutual Pining, One Shot, Run-On Sentences, Useless Lesbians, barista!louis, girl harry, girl louis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-14
Updated: 2018-03-14
Packaged: 2019-03-31 02:42:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13965615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flowercrownfemme/pseuds/flowercrownfemme
Summary: At fifteen Harry Styles had bushy hair, a B- in French 2, and what she would later come to realize was a massive and embarrassing crush on Louis Tomlinson.At twenty she had a job walking dogs and a roommate with a knack for scrapbooking, and was apparently still holding a torch for a certain blue-eyed barista.♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎A girl direction AU ft. lots of dogs, pining and shaved heads.





	My Kind Of Girl

    At fifteen Harry Styles wasn’t sure if she wanted more to be best friends with Louis Tomlinson or to simply _be_ her. Preferably some combination of the two, if that were possible, but she thought she’d be quite happy with either option - however unlikely they both seemed. Louis Tomlinson was two years older, lightyears cooler, and only slightly worse at French 2. Harry was sure that Louis was in her French class because she’d been too cool and too busy fighting The Man to be bothered with foreign languages as a sophomore and not, as their teacher was so apt to remind the class, because she’d failed it twice. There was no cosmic way that Louis Tomlinson could fail at anything, Harry was certain, because even when she broke her arm skateboarding she was still back behind the school every afternoon, clad in a bright green cast, practicing the move that had so rudely maimed her until she could perfectly execute a caballerial kickflip without fail. 

    At fifteen, half-hidden behind the gymnasium in what had become her official Watching Louis Tomlinson Spot, Harry felt stupidly jealous watching Zayn Malik congratulate Louis on her kickflip. She wanted to be the one to hug Louis when she did a move right and to bandage her up when she did it wrong. She wanted to be able to talk to Louis Tomlinson without stuttering, as she had the one and only time they’d been teamed up for a French project, when Louis had so patiently and kindly waited for Harry to gather her words every time she spoke and had copied every idea onto their paper without questioning it or trying to change it. They’d gotten a C on the project but Harry had kept it in the front of her notebook for the rest of the year, liking the way that her and Louis’ handwriting looked all mixed together.

    At fifteen Harry Styles didn’t know why her stomach dropped when Louis Tomlinson walked into French 2 one Monday in late November without a single hair on her head. Louis’ hair had always been exactly long enough to brush against Harry’s desk when she sat behind her and now it was all gone and it felt like the best thing that had ever happened. Now Harry could see every mole and freckle on the back of Louis’ head and when it started growing back the soft peach fuzz made her head look like it was covered in velvet. Harry spent a good month and a half debating whether or not she should shave her own head, but finally decided against it because she was too scared and because she didn’t want Louis to think she was copying her. 

 

♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎

 

    At seventeen Louis Tomlinson had to wait until the very early hours of the morning when nothing ever seems quite real or consequential before she was brave enough to shave her head, and even then it took a fifteen minute pep talk from Zayn before she even plugged in the electric razor.

 

♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎

 

    At twenty-two Louis Tomlinson had a degree in early childhood development and a minimum wage job. She and Zayn had each been working their way through uni with odd jobs but somehow settled together at a small hole-in-the-wall cafe with a pun-y name and a menu with barely a dozen drinks listed.

    “Did I spell that right?” Zayn asked, leaning back on the stool she was already precariously balanced on to get a better look at her own work. She had been putting her art degree to use by painting the weekly specials in ornate frames and illustrations on the wall above the counter. 

    “You forgot the ‘H’ again,” Louis told her, straightening a stack of mugs absentmindedly. “It’s M-A-C-C- _H_ -I-A-T-O.”

    “Shit,” Zayn muttered, grabbing the rag tucked into her back pocket to wipe away the still-wet paint.

    “That hazelnut’s looking more like a kiwi, by the way,” Louis mused. “While you’re at it.”

    Zayn flipped her off over her shoulder.

    “Not in front of the kids, would you?” Louis chastised, gesturing to her little brother and sister coloring at the front of the cafe. “They’ve already picked up enough bad habits as it is.”

    “If your mum wants me to be a good influence she should be paying me as a babysitter. Watching all three of you every Sunday is getting exhausting.”

    Louis at least shot a quick glance to her siblings to make sure they weren’t looking before raising her own middle finger.

    The morning rush always came later on Sundays than during the week, people dripping in like molasses, ordering more breakfast sandwiches and tea than the coffee and scones they’d order on their ways to work. Louis took orders and poured drinks while Zayn made up the food, circling around each other in perfect sync. That’s how they’d been working rushes since they started and realized that Louis didn’t have the artistic flair for plating food that Zayn had and that it took longer for Zayn to take orders because the customers always wanted to flirt with her. This way the lines moved quickly and customers didn’t complain that their oatmeal looked like bowls of dog food (which had only happened twice).

    It was just as Louis handed the last customer their order and finally took a deep breath that she realized her brother and sister weren’t at their usual table.

    She was about to start panicking and planning how to break it to her mum that she’d lost her youngest siblings when she caught a flash of strawberry blonde hair out the front windows of the cafe and practically vaulted over the counter to get to the door. 

    “Oi!” she shouted, yanking the door open and barreling out into the crisp morning air. “What do you think you’re doing?”

    The children looked up wide-eyed from the ground where they were both sitting, surrounded by at least seven different kinds of dogs who were all licking their hands and cheeks and rolling on their backs, eager for more pats and scratches. 

    “You’re both supposed to be inside where I can watch you, not running off and bothering customers,” she scolded, tugging them closer and glancing up at a girl with her hands full of leashes. “Sorry about them, they’re a couple of little menaces.”

    “No problem,” the girl said, blushing, and Louis paused because she _knew_ that girl and she without a doubt knew that blush.

 

♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎

 

    At nineteen Harry Styles realized after some brief experimentation that the reason she had never been boy crazy in middle school and had always considered herself very picky when it came to boys was that maybe she just didn’t like any boys at all. By twenty she’d realized that her feelings towards Louis Tomlinson had maybe not been longings of strong platonic friendship and had maybe been much closer to a crush. She could only hope that by some miracle Louis might not have noticed, although she was sure that anyone in a hundred mile radius must have seen her mooning after the older girl for half of her high school experience. 

    At twenty she was taking classes in literature while working in the school library Mondays and Wednesdays and walking dogs on Sundays. It was simple and provided some extra money and she liked dogs and being outside, as well as books, so it made for a nice routine.

    Her routine was disrupted however, when the subject of her teenage fantasies came tumbling out of a small cafe, scolding children and looking lovelier than ever in a dirty black apron and slip-proof shoes.

    Louis Tomlinson, whose eyes were even bluer than Harry remembered, whose voice still sounded like sunshine and happiness and who was still exactly the type of girl who could break Harry’s heart without an ounce of effort - but who would surely do it so softly and so gently that Harry would beg her to do it again.

    “Hey, I remember you,” Louis said, her eyes lighting up. “H-Harley? No. ‘H-something’ though, right?”

    The part of her that was still fifteen and obsessed with Louis Tomlinson felt a twinge of hurt that the older girl didn’t remember her name, but the twenty year old was hopeful that if she’d forgotten Harry’s name she might have forgotten about her crush as well.

    “Harry,” she supplied.

    “ _Harry_ ,” Louis repeated, and fifteen-year-old-Harry wanted to scream and write all over her diary that Louis Tomlinson said her name better than anyone she’d ever heard. “Sorry, ‘m shit with names. I was close though! We had French together, yeah? I’m Louis.”

    “Yeah,” Harry nodded, as though she too is only just remembering. As if she hadn’t spent a year of her life imagining a world where she and Louis were best friends, or one where Louis was her cool older sister, or one where Harry was a fair maiden locked in a tower and Louis was the lady-knight sent to rescue her. “Yeah, it was, um, Mr. White I think?”

    “Yes!” Louis laughed. “He hated me!”

    “Ugh, he was awful,” Harry agreed.

    “At least you passed on your first try,” Louis said, rolling her eyes self-deprecatingly. “What are you up to now? What’s with the dogs?”

    “Oh, I’ve been stealing them,” Harry explained dryly. “I’ve gotten very good - the last one was from a gated community. I had to climb so many fences, not to mention climbing back _with_ the dog. It was a nightmare, but Miss Emily here was worth it - weren’t you, girl?”

    She realized after a moment of silence that she didn’t actually _know_ Louis and Louis didn’t know her humor and very well might think she was a dog thief, but when she looked up Louis was smirking and she looked amused.

    “Sorry,” Harry blushed. “I walk peoples’ dogs. I don’t actually steal them.”

    “I’m disappointed. You could have been a great dog-burglar.”

    “Ha!” Harry barked, clapping her band over her mouth. “Like cat-burglar!”

    “Yes,” Louis smiled, turning to look back through the glass door at her siblings who were back at their usual table. Her hair had grown into a soft fringe that fell into her left eye if she didn’t tuck it behind her ear. The rest was still short and Harry wanted to feel it, preferably against her lips. “Now, I should probably get back to work before I have to turn to a life of crime meself.”

    Before Harry’s smile could turn into a full pout she continued, “Were you going to order anything to drink? Eat?”

    “I was planning on it,” Harry explained, “but I was trying to figure out the logistics first. I didn’t think you’d like a whole herd of dogs barging in but I didn’t want to leave them out here alone… I was about to give up and keep walking when those two came out.”

    “Well what can I get for you?” Louis asked with a smile. “Our special today’s a hazelnut macchiato.”

    “I _love_ hazelnut,” Harry admitted wistfully. “How much?”

    “On the house,” Louis shrugged. “I’ll have it right out.”

    Before Harry could protest the older girl had disappeared back into the cafe, leaving Harry at a small metal table surrounded by panting, warn-out dogs.

 

♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎

 

    “She walks dogs,” Louis sighed dreamily, yelping when her knuckle pressed against the metal of the espresso machine. “I want to walk dogs with her. I want to walk _our_ dogs with her.”

    “That’s great,” Zayn said. “Does she also have four dollars and seventy-five cents?”

    “ _Zayn_ ,” Louis bellowed. “That is Harry Fucking Styles! The prettiest and probably _gayest_ girl in the sophomore class! She can order whatever the fuck she wants.”

Harry Styles, who still flushed the loveliest shade of pink, whose bushy frizzy hair had grown down just past her shoulders into soft glossy curls and who was wearing overalls that must have been made for male construction workers but who wouldn’t look out of place on a red carpet wearing them. Harry Styles who was at that moment pouring bottled water into her cupped hand so that each dog could drink out of it in turn. Louis had never been more jealous of a dog in her life.

    “I thought we couldn’t curse in front of the kids.”

    “Shit!” Louis muttered. “Harry _Fudge-ing_ Styles, then. She’s gotta be, what? Twenty now? God, I almost forgot about her. I forgot her fucking- sorry, _fudge-ing_ name! I called her Harley. I bet she thinks I hate her. Zayn, please help me make this pretty.”

    Zayn looked over her shoulder at the steaming drink that Louis had carefully (if clumsily) dropped pink sugar sprinkles over.

    “Here,” she said, grabbing a bottle of caramel drizzle and pouring it over the top with an elegant flick of her wrist, leaving a curly heart over the foam.

    “I can’t give her that,” Louis hissed, her face pinched, “I don’t want to creep her out! That’s a _heart_ , I don’t want her to think I’m _flirting_ with her!”

    “But you are?” Zayn whispered, frowning.

    “Well I don’t want _her_ to know that!”

    “Either you hate her or you love her,” Zayn shrugged, exasperated. “Pick your poison.”

    Harry grinned so hard when she saw the drink that Louis thought she could curl up inside her left dimple and die happily there.

 

♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎

 

    It became a routine.

    Every Sunday at just past 11:30 Harry would sit down at an outside table with a hoard of dogs at her feet or on her lap and Doris or Ernie would come out with the weekly special (unless it was a hot drink, in which case Louis would bring it out herself) and play with the dogs while she sat and read or watched the people passing by. Most weeks Louis would come out at least once to talk and catch up and to ask her thoughts on the drink she’d made her that day. Once or twice she was too busy inside and couldn’t convince Zayn to cover for her and Harry was always disappointed, even though she’d already exchanged more words with Louis Tomlinson than she’d ever dreamed of.

    The second week she came in - when Doris had run out shouting “Puppies!” before Louis called her back inside and handed her an iced latte to bring Harry - she’d been surprised to find a pink ceramic dog bowl filled with water next to her table. When she looked through the front window grinning she just barely caught Louis’ eye before the older girl turned back to the register, pretending to ring up a nonexistent order.

    They skirted around each other, Louis sending drinks and sometimes muffins or pastries and Harry leaving cash tucked under the salt shaker on her table because Louis never accepted payment when she tried to offer it. Harry wanted more than a few passing words and some brief eye contact, had wanted more since the moment Louis Tomlinson walked in twenty minutes late to French 2 with a bag of fast food and tried to claim she should get extra credit for studying _french fries_ in her free time. But Harry knew that no matter what Louis tossed her way she’d always be wanting more because with Louis she wanted everything.

    She’d tried complaining to her roommate/best friend Niall but the blonde girl had offered more ridicule than advice:

    “I thought I was never gonna see her again and she would just be this nice, slightly cringey memory from high school. I was _okay_ with that!” Harry had whined. “I was so embarrassing, I kind of figured I’d just avoid ever talking to anyone who had to witness that - especially the girl I was being so embarrassing _about!_ ”

    “You can’t have been _that_ bad,” Niall reasoned.

    “I smelled her hair,” Harry told her, deadpan. “Every time we had to pass papers down the rows I leaned forward and I smelled her hair and then I smelled every shampoo I could find until I found the one I thought she used and I bought it.”

    “Jesus Christ,” Niall laughed. “Please tell me you don’t still do that with girls you fancy.”

    “I dunno,” Harry shrugged. “I’ve never fancied anyone else that bad.”

    Niall was looking at her like she might cry and was probably planning a Dream Wedding Scrapbook for her in her head. Harry loved Niall’s scrapbooks but she didn’t want to see her and Louis’ faces cut out and pasted onto wedding dress models with rainbow flags and glitter all around them. She’d already received one with herself and every celebrity she’d ever mentioned finding attractive and she was running out of room on her bookshelf.

    “I didn’t even use the shampoo,” she continued. “Just kept it in the drawer next to my bed.”

    “Oh no,” Niall cackled, trying to look sympathetic but failing as she fell back against their couch and clapped her hands gleefully. “You can’t tell her that until at least after you’re married and she’s obligated to love you still. That’s some serial killer shit, Haz.”

    And so, when Harry approached the cafe just after closing on a Wednesday night - after spending her entire shift at the library thinking about blue eyes and caramel hair - she was determined to ignore the shy flustered teen inside of her who wanted to count Louis Tomlinson’s eyelashes and maybe save small clippings of her hair in an ornate wooden box, and to maybe talk to her like a normal person for once. Even though just one small glimpse through the front windows of Louis cleaning the counters, lit by the golden-toned light bulbs above her and the blue fluorescents in the pastry case below, made her heart feel like a submarine being crushed by the weight of the ocean. She had kissed girls - _multiple girls!_ \- but with the smallest flick of her fringe Louis Tomlinson made her feel like a blushing, stuttering fifteen year old with her first crush.

 

♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎

 

    Zayn had left Louis alone to close the cafe and she probably wouldn’t get home until midnight at least. But Zayn had finally asked out Liam and they were going on their first date so Louis couldn’t say no, even if it meant she’d have to stay later. Liam was the cafe’s manager who Louis found much too responsible but who made up for it in friendliness. When Louis had first applied at the cafe she’d been slightly mesmerized by her big tits and even bigger biceps before Liam had started listing rules and regulations and immediately lost any sex appeal she might have held. Evidently not in Zayn’s eyes though, judging by how flustered she got whenever Liam came out to help during a rush or to cash out their registers. Louis could remember how red Zayn’s face had been the whole day when Liam had come to work without a bra and Louis couldn’t wait to tease her about it at their wedding. That and the Halloween when Liam had accidentally added a very explicit version of “Monster Mash” to the daily playlist and had run screaming across the cafe to turn it off when she’d realized.

    She was mentally dictating the third draft of her best-woman speech when she heard a tap at the front window.

    It was Harry, because of course it was Harry.

    She looked lovely, with her hair blown all out of place by the wind and her cheeks ruddy from the cold. Louis wanted her to look that way always, but she’d also sooner set herself on fire than she’d let Harry Styles go cold so she sped around the counter to let the girl in.

    “Hi,” Harry breathed, her lips pink and a bit chapped. Her coat had a white fleece collar and Louis wanted to pull it away from her neck and press her lips to the warm skin underneath.

    “Hi,” Louis replied, keeping her lips to herself.

    “Hi,” Harry repeated, and Louis wasn’t sure if her grin was frozen in place from the cold or if she was maybe just happy to see her. She hoped it was the latter.

    “You said that already,” Louis laughed, stepping further back into the cafe so that Harry would follow her. She did.

    “Sorry,” Harry said, still grinning hard enough that it looked almost painful. She looked around at the cafe, seemingly mesmerized. “I’ve never been inside before.”

    Her green eyes looked almost gold in the low warm light.

    “It’s not much,” Louis shrugged.

    “It’s lovely,” Harry argued, taking in the vases of dried rosemary and lavender and the walls and stools which were painted a soft robin’s egg blue. There was a small sitting area in the corner with a couch and two armchairs, all littered with mismatched throw pillows, and Louis could picture Harry curled up there with a mug of tea. She _had_ pictured it, numerous times, especially on particularly slow days. 

 _You’re lovely,_ she wanted to say.

    “Any particular reason you were drawn in this evening?” Louis asked, leaning back against the counter. “I’m just closing now but if you want anything to drink I could probably turn some stuff back on.”

    “Oh no,” Harry shook her head, stepping close enough that Louis could have reached out and smoothed the little wrinkle between the girl’s brows with her finger. “I got off work at the library and I wanted to say hi.”

    “I think we went over that,” Louis smiled wryly. “A few times, actually, but you can never be too thorough. Hi.”

    “Hi.”

    Harry took another step forward, until the toes of their shoes were nearly touching, and Louis could feel her own breath hitch.

    “Thank you,” Harry said softly. “For all the drinks, I mean. For letting me take up the whole front patio every weekend.”

    “It’s the least I could do,” Louis shrugged. “Thanks for watching my brother and sister every weekend. They really like all your dogs, you know. They’ve been asking our mum for one now, but hopefully they’ll be able to satiate that desire for a bit with all yours. I think - ”

    “ _Lou_ is,” Harry sighed, a small frown on her face and frustration in her voice.

    “Yeah?” Louis asked, her eyes wide, feeling a bit frozen.

    “I just…” she started, huffing out a breath and clenching her fists, “I’m like, really _gay_. Like a full on proper lesbian. And I have been for forever, like since I was a _baby_ , but I didn’t even know until, like, a year ago but I should have fucking _realized_ because I had the biggest stupidest lesbian crush on you and you’re just so _nice_ all the time and this is probably so weird, like I know I sound insane, but I’m just, like, _so gay_ and I think you maybe are too? Like I thought so, in High School, but I could be wrong - God, I _hope_ I'm not wrong - and I don’t know what - ” 

    “Harry,” Louis cut her off, grinning.

    “Yeah?” Harry asked, finally meeting Louis’ eyes and licking her lips nervously.

    “Do you think I could kiss you? I’ve sort of been waiting to for a while now.”

    “Yeah,” Harry nodded stiffly, as though agreeing to a business deal. “Yes. Please.”

    So Louis did, one hand cupped around the back of her neck, her fingers dipping down to feel the soft warm skin under the collar of her coat, and the other slung around her waist. They kissed until they couldn’t breathe anymore, even though Louis was sure her mouth tasted of stale coffee and her hands were still sticky with spilled syrups. Harry just kissed her harder, licking into her mouth and pressing her back against the counter.

    “I _knew_ you weren’t straight,” Louis grinned triumphantly when they’d finally caught their breath.

    “What’s that supposed to mean?” Harry asked, trying to fein offense or confusion or _something_ even though there was a giddy thrill shooting through her chest that Louis must have seen something in her even before she did - something that made them the same.

    “I mean I _thought,_ ” Louis amended, her thumb softly stroking the side of Harry’s jaw, “or I _hoped_. I don’t know, you can just tell, can’t you? It’s hard to explain. But you look at someone and you just _know_. You can see it, kind of.”

    It was like Louis’d told her that there’d been lipstick on her teeth, how casually she said it. Harry imagined pirouetting by the front door every morning and asking the other girl, “Is my lesbianism showing?” She imagined Louis pulling her close and kissing her, telling her it was always showing, like some kind of neon sign that only other lesbians could see. Like they were spies who could blend in undetected by everyone but each other.

    “Yeah,” Harry nodded, tangling their hands between them. “I know what you mean.”

    “Harry?” Louis asked, pulling the girl’s hair off to one side and running her nose along the exposed skin of her neck.

    “Yeah?” Harry murmured.

    “I’ve got the day off from work tomorrow,” Louis told her, letting her lips brush against her throat and grinning when she felt Harry shiver. “Would you like to have breakfast with me? And maybe lunch? Dinner as well, if that’s not too forward.”

    “I’d love to,” Harry smiled, catching Louis’ chin and pulling the older girl back to kiss her again. “But first, um, I should, uh, probably tell you something. Do you remember the, um, the shampoo you used in high school?”

    Louis wondered exactly how much time had to pass before it was acceptable to ask someone to move in with you.

 

♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎

 

    At twenty-four Harry Styles had three dogs, two published children’s books and one live-in girlfriend. The books had been co-written with the aforementioned girlfriend and were helping her to make a convincing argument on why they should be having their own children. She hoped that it would only take another PowerPoint presentation and maybe one more of Niall’s baby scrapbooks before Louis agreed to start looking into the many ways that two women in love could get their hands on a baby.

 

♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎ ♥︎

 

    At twenty-six Louis Tomlinson had three dogs, two published children’s books and one ring hidden away in the back of her sock drawer, tucked inside her plainest pair of socks that she knew Harry would never try and steal. She was waiting for just the right moment, but she wasn’t sure how much longer she could wait - especially considering the nine years she’d already waited.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!  
> The title is from The Ramones' "My Kind Of Girl" and the anecdote about Liam accidentally playing the explicit version of "Monster Mash" on Halloween is based on when my printmaking teacher did that during class. It's called "Monster Fuck" and it's maybe the worst thing I've ever heard.  
> You can find me on tumblr at flower-crown-femme :)  
> <3 <3 <3


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